A mishmash

I feel like I have a ton to blog. And I've been trying recently to put more thought into my words in this space. To take the time to express myself in a more beautiful way. But with the disarray around the house as we play musical rooms, and planning Zeke's small and simple but still a birthday party this weekend...well I can hardly organize my thoughts in my own mind, let alone on the keyboard. I have said it a thousand times and yet still I am constantly surprised by how much a disordered home makes for a disordered mind, at least for me. But things are looking up. We are soo sooo close to being done moving everything around.

So until that fine fine moment, when I can breathe in the knowledge that everything HAS a place and is IN that place....

A mishmash.

1. The garden is doing great, better honestly then I expected. I should have taken some pictures, but I didnt so just use your imagination. The strawberries are fruiting, the tomatoes and peas are flowering, the peppers look the same as always I have to admit...but they aren't dead! (except for one that was I suspect eaten by a cat but we ended up in the end with 11 peppers so I think I can spare to lose one. We've had more lettuce then we know what to do with, and enough spinach to not buy any for weeks now (and that is saying something because I eat a LOT of spinach). The beans have come up out of the ground and the squash have been planted (hopefully not too late, it was into June by the time I got around to it).This has been a really fun experience. I love to dig around in the dirt and I love how excited Zeke has been watching everything grow. He plants "seeds" ALL day long in his dirt pile in the yard.I'm also getting a whole new respect for people that actually had to grow all their food. With bugs and surprise freezes and pesky cats not to mention toddlers my garden is in a constant state of danger. I cant imagine knowing that our very lives depended on it. After all, if my garden fails it only means I need to go to the grocery store. For some, it meant starvation the next winter.2. Zeke is really cracking me up these days. He's been using all sorts of new body language, I can see him really studying and copying the way I hold myself. Not to mention a TON of new words, he is really getting talking lately. He can sing twinkle twinkle, and the itsy bitsy spider, although his favorite song right now is the Battle Hymn of the Republic...that and Bad Romance (he's only heard the Glee version, not the lady gaga...Zeke and I LOVE Glee). He's also started to get more and more imaginative in his play, which is so exciting to watch. I'm loving having a toddler. Even when he tells me I'm "no nice!".3. Malachi is also cracking me up. He is getting sooo angry at his inability to do everything Zekey does. This kid absolutely HATES being left out!! We've put his crib in the boys' new room 2 days ago and he's slept in there from 9 till 4 am one night and until 6am the other. You cant imagine how exciting that is for me, lol. At this point I'm going in there more often for Zeke.4. Our neighbor gave us this awesome slide her kids have outgrown. Zeke wanted to push Mal down, but I convinced him baby Burt might enjoy it better.5. Since I have to move all of our books I've decided to get rid of some of them. We have a ton of books, this is a little under 1/3rd of our collection:But I have to admit not all of our books are really treasured...many we will likely never read again. So I signed up for paperbackbookswapper.com and I've already mailed 4 out, giving me 4 credits to get books that we actually WANT. I'll probably wait a few months and then just donate the rest of the books that no one wanted, but its nice to get a few good books out of the pile of bad ones (though I almost feel bad giving away some of my pregnancy books of the "what to expect when expecting" caliber, it seems wrong to continue the misinformation)

6. I read The Tent a few years ago but this poem has come up twice now in conversations this week. It was my favorite from the collection, although honestly I'm young enough that its talking about more of my grandmothers' generation. Well worth the read.

Bring back Mom,bread-baking Mom, in her crisp gingham apronjust like the aprons we sewed for herin our Home Economics classesand gave to her for a surpriseon Mother's Day--

Mom, who didn't have a jobbecause why would she need one,who made our school lunches--the tuna sandwich, the apple,the oatmeal cookies wrapped in wax paper--with the rubber band she'd saved in a jar;doing the ironingor something equally boring,

who smiled the weak smile of a trapped drudgeas we slid past her,headed for the phone,filled with surliness and contemptand the resolve never to be like her.

Bring back Mom.who wanted to be a concert pianistbut never had the chanceand made us take piano lessons,which we resented--

Mom, whose aspic ringsand Jello salads we ate with greed,though later derided--pot-roasting Mom, expert with onionsthough anxious in the face of garlic,who received a brand-new frying panfrom us each Christmas--just what she wanted--

Mom, her dark lipsticked mouthsmiling in the black-and-whitesoap ads, the Aspirin ads, the toilet paper ads,Mom, with her secret lifeof headaches and stained washingand irritated membranes--Mom, who knew the dirt,and hid the dirt, and did the dirty work,and never saw herselfor us as clean enough--

and who believed that there was other dirtyou shouldn't tell to children,and didn't tell it,which was dangerous only later.

We miss you, Mom,though you were reviled to great profitin magazines and booksfor ruining your children--that would be us--by not loving them enough,by loving them too much,by wanting too much love from them,by some failure of love--

(Mom, whose husband left herfor his secretary and paid alimony,Mom, who drank in solitudein the afternoons, watching TV,who dyed her hair an implausibleshade of red, who flirtedwith her friends' husbands at parties,trying with all her mightnot to sink below the linebetween chin up and despair--

and who was carted awayand locked up, because one dayshe began screaming and wouldn't stop,and did something very badwith the kitchen scissors--

But that wasn't you, not you, notthe Mom we had in mind, it wasthe nutty lady down the street--it was just some ladywho became a casultyof unseen accidents,and then a lurid story...)

Queen of the waffle iron,generous dispenser of toothpaste,sorceress of Mercurochrome,player of smoky bridgeat which you won second-prize dishtowels,

brooder over the darning eggthat hatched nothing but socks,boiler of horrible porridge--climb back onto the cake-mix package,look brisk and competent, the way you used to--

If only we could call you--Here Mom, Here Mom--and you would come clip-cloppingon your daytime Cuban heels,smelling of sink and lilac,(your bum encased in the foundation garmetyou'd peel off at nightwith a sigh like a marsh exhaling),saying, What is it now,and we could catch youin a net, and cage youin your bungalow, where you belong,and make you stay--

Then everything would be all rightthe way it was when we could playtill after dark on spring evenings,then sleep without fearbecause you threw yourself in front of the fearand stopped it with your body--

And there you'll be, in your cotton housecoat,holding a wooden pegbetween your teeth, as the washing flapson the clothesline you once briefly consideredhanging yourself with--

but forget that! There you'll be,singing a song of your own youthas though no time has passed,and we can be careless again,and embarrassed by you,and ignore you as we used to,

"The best things in life are nearest: Breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of right just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life’s plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things in life". ~Robert Louis Stevenson